(1) Summary of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method to reliably reconstruct linear time sequences of critical historical events from perspectives of two or more parties. Specifically, the method permits mapping of events pertaining to formation of a joint venture from the perspectives of partners A and B. In particular, the present invention relates to a map which enables the joint venturers to pinpoint communication failures during the process of joint venture formation, and to more effectively conduct and/or assess the performance of the joint venture.
(2) Prior Art
One significant phenomenon reported recently in the organizational science literature is the increasing frequency of organizational partnerships or joint ventures (JVs). Joint ventures permit two or more autonomous organizational entities to pool their strengths in order to accomplish a goal that neither would have been able to achieve alone. The most salient characteristics of the joint venture (or partnership), and those which distinguish it from other forms of interorganizational relations, are: 1. the primacy of goal-oriented resource pooling as a raison d'etre; and 2. continuing management oversight from two or more autonomous organizational parents. Joint ventures not only perform all the major functions of interorganizational linkages generally (i.e. resource exchange and management of turbulence), but also are intended to bring an added degree of stability, long-term commitment and economies of scale to the relationship. Organizational joint ventures may occur in the public sector (e.g. linkages between health and welfare organizations), the private sector (e.g. international joint business ventures), or may cross sectors by joining public and private organizations (e.g. relationships between universities and industry). In addition, joint ventures may be used to join organizations that are based in one nation (i.e. domestic joint ventures, or JVs), or those that are based in two or more different nations (i.e. international joint ventures, or IJVs.)
While the number of joint ventures is increasing, their long-term effectiveness is constrained by the fact that JV's suffer from a relatively high degree of instability and are subject to frequent dissolution; in two major studies of private sector JVs, one-quarter of the JV's failed to survive the study period. Unfortunately, the reasons why IJVs fail are not clear. Several competing hypotheses have been advanced to explain joint venture instability, with one of the most logical being the explanation that discordance in structural factors related to organizational, product or industry characteristics of the two corporate partners are primary causes for friction and disruption. More recently, scholarly efforts have focused on the dynamic or process-related aspects of joint venture instability, including discordant parental objectives in IJV formation, or changes in parental objectives over time.
Among this latter group of explanations, one sub-hypothesis holds that the partners' objectives diverge over time, making the JV more and more difficult to manage and less successful (or productive) from the standpoint of one or both partners. Another related sub-hypothesis holds that the partners never really understood one another's interests and objectives in the first place (partly as the result of cross-cultural mis-cummunication). According to this sub-hypothesis, the partners gradually come to understand one another's true intentions over time, and they gradually realize that the venture cannot satisfy the requirements of both parties. Alternately, they realize that earlier misunderstandings have created serious management problems which reduce the venture's performance. In many of these cases, the partners resolve their difficulties through dissolution of the venture or through sellout to one party. While this group of hypotheses is interesting and attractive to many researchers, the hypotheses have been difficult to test with traditional research techniques that dominate the social sciences (i.e. structured interviewing, usually directed to one partner only, with results analyzed and displayed in a generally qualitative (i.e. textual format.)
In order to test these hypotheses it is necessary to use methods that: (a) accurately portray differences in both partners' perceptions of the JV experience; (b) have a high degree of cross-cultural or cross-organizational validity (i.e. are not biased through preconceptions imposed by the culture or organization of one partner); and (c) also are reliable (i.e. yield the same results for different researchers).
The method of the present invention was developed as a research tool to provide a valid and reliable window on cross-cultural or cross-organizational understanding and communication during the planning and early operating stages of a JV. The method produces two different chronologies of critical events leading up to and deriving from the formation of the JV--one from the perspective of each partner. The objective is to see the past with as little distortion as possible through the eyes of two different parties and to compare these historical perspectives in an effort to identify points of breakdown in cross-cultural communication and understanding. The theoretical foundations of the method rest in cognitive psychology and anthropology (specifically ethnoscience). Theoretically speaking, the method is not designed to produce an "objective" reconstruction of the past, but to produce two valid "subjective" accounts that can be compared for diagnostic purposes.
The method yields data that permits clear identification of differences in the partners' interpretations of the past, e.g. what happened, what was important and why, what was forgotten or ignored, how and why events were linked. The method can determine whether and where significant communication breakdowns occurred, and how these breakdowns may have led to emergent issues and problems in the JV. Such information, especially when linked to a body of cross-cultural knowledge that allow generalization and prediction from specific cases, is very useful to managers in diagnosing JV problems, and in planning future JV's.